I flew to Washington DC this previous weekend to run the Marine Corps Marathon 10k and it was awesome. I have not run a 10k race since the GC marathon over 3 years ago. Back then I was a good 20kg or more heavier, and it was the first time I had ever run 10k. Since then I have only ever run 10k once and that was by accident (I got lost, it happens, you can run 10k by accident trust me) so this was an all out effort.
I was a little bit scared after seeing a couple of photos from the day from someone who was running the Marathon from the packet pickup area. Lines were on average 2 hours around mid afternoon and that was just to get your packet with race number etc. That was not exactly the news I wanted to hear as I was cutting it fine already getting off a flight from the west coast and going straight there after the hotel. I didn’t want to have to go their directly from the airport (as I had no idea how I was going to do that anyway) but I kept to my plan and thankfully the lines were not to bad when I got there (only 30 mins or so). I wasn’t really going to be doing much at the “Expo” where packet pick up was anyway as I had been up since 2am so was just wanting to get my stuff, get back to the hotel, get some dinner and get some sleep as the run was first thing Sunday morning.
Thankfully the hotel I was staying at was not to far from the start line so I didn’t spend all morning trying to get to the start line, just a few minutes on one train, swap to another go one more stop and I was there (saved walking in the cold). The start line area was really busy with people in the subway station (where it was warm) or plenty of people stretched around the race start through various spots. The line up for the port a loo was HUGE stretching almost 100m long and about 20 or 30m in width, not the best if you desperately needed to go (thankfully I didn’t). Got the usual photos you would expect, sealed my bag and let UPS take it from there to the finish line and I settled in to wait. The race finally started with a unique starting gun… a Howitzer! Yep wouldn’t be the marines if there wasn’t a cannon involved.
I was really happy to be running and was suprised at just how many people were running as when I passed the 1 mile marker you could see back to the race start and I wasn’t exactly at the front of the pack, but there was still people waiting to get across the start line. with 10,000 people running the 10k I would think it was the largest race I have competed in (not sure how many people ran the Jingle Bell Run last year or at the GC Marathon). The full Marathon had over 20,000 people competing and they would of gotten the full experience compared to us. The streets were lined with marines and staff at all points and they were all their to encourage us. A lot of the Marines who were staffing the points were yelling the current time to encourage us more, a lot were giving high 5s etc so it was a great atmosphere. The run ran through the National Mall area and then over the Bridge into Virginia, through a few areas of Crystal City, past the Pentagon and into the final stretch up to the Marine Corp Memorial in Arlington (near the National cemetery). The MCM10K site had said that it follows the same “Final Uphill” stretch that the full Marathon gets, and this was the portion that I was worried about the most. Probably didn’t need to worry so much as it was no where near as bad as I had thought it would be. To be honest I need not have worried at all, as the final “uphill” portion was about 250m and although it was a challenge, it was nothing like the hills I had been training on.
The last uphill portion though was definately where the enthusiasm set in. The street was PACKED with marines and staff (its a closed circuit for some reason at this point) and they were there to get us across the line as quickly and easily as possible. Their was encouraging words painted on the street and there was high 5s at every turn if you wanted them. I pushed hard up the hill and finished strong. The photos haven’t come out yet but hopefully my finishing photo is better than my one from the GC Marathon (i look like a doofus in that photo). I managed to get across the line, take a look at my watch and a giant smile came across my face. I had been aiming to do the run in under an hour and been training hard for it (well not Triathlon hard but still been pushing some of my runs hard). When I crossed that line, I saw my time and I was ecstatic, happy as hell that the training paid off. My last distance training run in Wellington had me 3 minutes under expected time, well I beat that, I was over 4 mins under… I finished the 10k in 55mins & 43 seconds…. OOORAH!!!
After all is said and done, I feel extremely happy that I was able to get this done and get the times I wanted. A lot has changed in the last 10 months, I still have one more fitness goal this year (I comitted to two 5ks before the end of the year) and so i still have more to do, but right now, I am looking forward to a bit of a slow down. Maybe the 10k was good for me, maybe I needed that extra little push, I need to get back on track weight goal wise right now, drop back under that 180lb mark that I am sitting at (not that there is anything wrong with where I am at right now) and perhaps refocus for next year. Does this 10K also mean that I need to push harder next time, or is it a stepping stone towards a half marathon? I have already put thoughts into a challenge for next year, and already told a friend that if he does a triathlon, I would join him, but maybe a half marathon is in my future. A Full marathon though is NOT on the cards. I am NOT that crazy.
